More headlines: Harry Browne on Government Reform

Reform government by abiding by Constitution

What I want to see is our government abiding by the Constitution, which would end the nightmare of drug prohibition. It would end the income tax. It would end government stealing your Social Security. It would end all of these things and return us to a
free country of individual liberty and personal responsibility where people do pay the consequences of their acts, where they don’t make babies and don’t take care of them, where they don’t do all the things that you’re afraid of.

Source: Matt Drudge, ‘The Drudge Report,’ Fox News
Jul 31, 1999

Repeal all campaign finance laws, they favor incumbents

Browne does not support legislation prohibiting PAC contributions to candidates for federal office, & does not support establishing spending limits on congressional campaigns. Browne supports eliminating the check-off box (for the presidential campaign)
from the personal income tax form. He would “repeal all campaign finance laws. They are biased toward incumbents, and toward the two old parties. Eliminate ballot restrictions that discriminate against third parties and independent candidates.”

Source: 1996 National Political Awareness Test
May 1, 1996

Government feeds growth of more government

Each government program carries within it the seeds of future programs that will be “needed” to clean up the mess the first program creates. No matter how much mischief it causes, government always shows up in a cavalry uniform--riding in to
rescue us from the problems it created.

Government runs a deposit insurance program that begs savings & loans to speculate freely--and then spends billions of our dollars to clean up the mess.

Government regulates drug companies
into near paralysis--and then spends billions of our dollars to subsidize drug research.

Government cripples American companies with punitive taxes and mountains of regulation--and then spends billions
of our dollars trying to find foreign markets for those crippled companies.

By preventing people and companies from taking care of themselves, government feeds its own growth.

Great Society: federal takeover of ed., welfare, crime

Until 1960 the federal government had practically nothing to do with education, crime control, or welfare (except Social Security). But by 1975, Great Society programs led to the federal government dominating all three areas.In each case the pattern
was the same: The federal government provided financial subsidies to state and local governments--and, once the governments became dependent on the money from Washington, the Feds imposed conditions for continuing to receive it.Although the money for
a community comes from citizens in that same community, routing it through Washington allows the Feds to set the rules. Thus they began setting standards for school curricula, welfare eligibility, and police procedures and budgets.By taking control
away from communities, the federal government made schools, police, and welfare systems even more remote from the people who pay for them and rely upon them--and made them more susceptible to fraud and graft, and to meddling by social reformers.